Traveling Companions

I have less than two months left in Indonesia. I promise to share some more meaningful reflections on how I am feeling about this. But, for now, I am posting on a more superficial topic. I want to introduce you to some of my companions. While they've not quite reached the relational status of Wilson in Cast Away (I only recently started calling some of them by name), they are very much a part of my daily life and on occasion I may be heard talking to them.

And here they are:

First, meet my Patagonia Atom backpack, which features an easy-to-access hp (cell phone) pouch. I don't have to hunt for my phone and I can pretty well guarantee nobody will try to snatch it from beneath my nose. There's an outer slim pocket where I keep my flash drive and flash cards. On the outside I can attach my beach towel, sarong, or extra shirt. The Atom is ideal for getting around by motorbike. I can swing it in front of me when I need to grab my wallet, rather than having to take it off as I would with a backpack with two straps.

My friend Katy sent me a SIGG bottle via Todd. I had decided not to pack my large SIGG because I figured I'd be stuck buying bottles of drinking water. But, as it turns out, we have dispenser in our place so the SIGG has seen its share of Java. It goes to the gym, campus, on day trips, and to restaurants with me.

Before departing, my friend Allison gave us a beautiful lime-green leather journal. It has become my language/field note journal and I am always glad for the times I remember to bring it with me. Looking at my earlier notes reminds me of how much I had yet to learn.

This sarong is a more recent purchase. It's lightweight and versatile and 100% Indonesian.

When it comes to research, my sweet Lenovo netbook has been clutch, as we say in So Cal. It's fallen from overhead storage on a bus and the case is as dirty as my childhood blankie. And, it survives the heat, intense electrical currents, and the daily grind. Yet another plug for Atom (the backpack): the Lenovo fits inside.

Finally, since I can't carry around my exhaustive dictionaries, this pocket dictionary has seen a lot of love in the past few months.

So happy together

Schooling in the Art of Jamu

They ride on bicycles with straw baskets strapped to their back. Behind them tall and short bottles filled with various shades of amber-colored liquid peak out of the top. Stop them and buy a glass of jamu, a traditional, medicinal drink containing a mix of spices including turmeric, tamarind, and palm sugar. Jamu gendong, or a woman selling jamu around the village, will have an assortment of jamu in tote. With the varieties of jamu comes a host of health benefits, many of which are intended for women. Jamu can increase circulation, cure a cough, or keep you looking young.

I buy jamu from a dear friend who makes it and sells it to her network of friends. Yesterday she let me watch her make jamu just in case I can’t kick the addiction when I get back to the U.S.

Ingredients are best purchased at traditional markets in the morning hours. A kilo of turmeric (about 40 cents), a bag of palm sugar cubes (about $1), and a bag of tamarind (about 50 cents). Anti begins by peeling the turmeric the root you see in one of the photos below. She then slices it into pieces and puts it in a strainer. She runs water over it into a large bowl. The sediment which forms is more sticky than glue and apparently is not good to ingest. That’s why she lets it settle overnight. The paste also stains skin and clothes.

The next day when I watched she poured the turmeric mixture into a larger stainless steel pot for boiling. She droped in eight or 10 cubes of palm sugar and wads of tamarind and added two pitchers of water. We waited for a half an hour for the jamu to boil. Meanwhile, she finished drying the soaked and cleaned bottles to fill her orders. She added a few more palm sugar cubes.

When the jamu had boiled long enough she removed the tamarind clumps and then poured it over a strainer again. She let it cool for an hour or two before bottling it. While jamu is mass-produced and even comes in the form of a pill, nothing replaces the earthy taste of Anti's jamu.